Lower Carboniferous Echinoderms from Northern Utah and Western Wyoming

Book excerpt: An abundance of crinoid ossicles was noted in the early reports of Lower Carboniferous strata of northern Utah and southeastern Idaho. Articulated crinoid cups and crowns, however, were not reported. Collections of the past 50 years and especially the past 15 years have found significant numbers of well-preserved crinoid cups and crowns along with a few echinoids, blastoids, and asterozoans in the Gardison Limestone of the Wasatch Range, Henderson Canyon Formation of the Bear River Range, Wellsville Mountain, and northern parts of the Wasatch Range of northern Utah, as well as in the Lodgepole Limestone of western Wyoming. The purposes of this paper are to describe the crinoids, blastoid, and echinoids from northern Utah and western Wyoming, discuss their relationship to previously described faunas from North America and Europe, and relate their stratigraphic occurrences to conodont zonations and their geographic occurrence to recent interpretations of the regional carbonate facies and tectonic setting.